Tech - Azzet - Business news, investments companies & executives

Sign inJoin Now

Tech

Tech
Texas Instruments misses estimates, gains on guidance
Texas Instruments missed estimates on revenue and earnings last quarter, but shares rose 8.1% after-hours following strong first quarter guidance. Revenue was US$4.42 billion, rising 10.4% year-over-year but under Zacks estimates of $4.44 billion. Earnings per share were $1.27, down from $1.30 and below estimates of $1.30. “Our cash flow from operations of $7.2 billion for the trailing 12 months again underscored the strength of our business model, the quality of our product portfolio and the benefit of 300mm production. Free cash flow for the same period was $2.9 billion,” said CEO Haviv Ilan. “TI's first quarter outlook is for revenue in the range of $4.32 billion to $4.68 billion and earnings per share between $1.22 and $1.48.” LSEG estimates included revenue of $4.42 billion and earnings per share of $1.26. Analog segment revenue was up 14% to $3.62 billion, while Embedded Processing revenue rose 8% to $662 million. Other revenue dropped by 34% to $146 million. Revenue for its data centre segment was up 70% last quarter, Ilan said on an earnings call. This is the first quarter that it has released revenue figures for sales to data centre customers. Operating profit last quarter increased by 7% to $1.47 billio
Tech
Intel shares fall 4% as soft outlook dims revenue beat
Legacy chipmaker Intel posted fourth-quarter revenue of US$13.7 billion for fiscal 2025 - down 4% from the prior year but beating the Street's expectation of $13.41 billion. Non-GAAP earnings per share landed at $0.15, comfortably ahead of the $0.08 consensus estimate, though the company reported a GAAP loss of $0.12 per share. Despite the top-and-bottom-line beat, weak guidance for the first quarter of 2026 sent shares slipping 4% in trading. The chipmaker forecasts Q1 revenue between $11.7 billion and $12.7 billion - missing the $12.55 billion consensus - and expects breakeven non-GAAP EPS, well below the $0.05 analysts had pencilled in. "We exceeded Q4 expectations across revenue, gross margin, and EPS even as we navigated industry-wide supply shortages," Intel CFO David Zinsner said. "We expect our available supply to be at its lowest level in Q1 before improving in Q2 and beyond." Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan, who took the helm in March 2025, emphasised the company's manufacturing progress. "The introduction of our first products on Intel 18A – the most advanced process technology developed and manufactured in the United States – marks an important milestone, and we’re working aggressively to grow supply to meet
Tech
GE Aerospace beats estimates with strong order growth
GE Aerospace beat estimates on revenue and earnings last quarter as orders for its engines surged. Revenue was up 18% year-over-year to US$11.87 billion, above estimates of $11.2 billion. Earnings per share rose 19% to $1.57, passing estimates of $1.43. “With a strong fourth quarter, GE Aerospace delivered an outstanding year as revenue grew 21%, EPS was up 38%, and free cash flow conversion exceeded 100%,” said GE Aerospace CEO Larry Culp. “We enter 2026 with solid momentum to build upon these results and are well positioned to create greater value for our customers. This supports another year of substantial EPS and cash growth, and I'm confident our team will deliver.” Its commercial engines and services orders last quarter climbed by 76% to $22.84 billion, with equipment orders more than doubling. Defence and propulsion technologies orders were up 61% to $4.57 billion. Operating profit increased by 14% to $2.27 billion. The company’s full-year guidance for 2026 includes operating profit of $9.85-10.25 billion and earnings per share of $7.10-7.40, above estimates of $7.11. It expects commercial engines and services revenue growth in the mid-teens percentages. GE Aerospace (NYSE: GE) shares dropped 7.4% to cl
Tech
TSMC smashes records with 35% profit jump
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) has delivered a monumental fourth quarter (Q4) performance with a forecast-smashing 35% jump in profit to a record high, cementing its role as the primary engine of the global AI boom. The impressive margin comes as the world's leading chipmaker continues to outpace rivals, with its valuation reflecting the unprecedented scale of modern compute demand. The Taiwanese giant also posted a net profit of NT$505.7 billion (US$16 billion) for the final three months of 2025. This result represents the company's seventh straight quarter of double-digit growth, far exceeding analyst expectations. Looking ahead, the firm expects first-quarter revenue could surge by as much as 40% to reach $35.8 billion. Management also projected that annual revenue for 2026 will rise by nearly 30% in U.S. dollar terms.ExpansionTo meet intensifying demand, TSMC is accelerating its expansion in the United States. TSMC CEO C.C. Wei confirmed that the company is applying for permits to build a fourth factory and its first advanced packaging plant in Arizona. This move follows an earlier pledge of $65 billion for three plants in the state, one of which is already operational. Taiwan has sig
Tech
Apple relegates OpenAI as it turns to Gemini for Siri
Apple has officially announced a multi-year partnership with Google to integrate the Gemini AI engine into its revamped Siri assistant. The agreement, confirmed on 12 January 2026, marks a pivotal victory for Alphabet in the AI arms race, driving its market capitalisation past the US$4 trillion milestone for the first time. Under the deal, Google’s Gemini models and cloud technology will serve as the core foundation for the next generation of Apple Foundation Models,. It also opens the AI software up to a massive install base of over two billion active devices globally. Apple, which had previously integrated OpenAI’s ChatGPT for complex outbound queries in late 2024, signalled a strategic shift by selecting Google as its primary partner for this deeper integration. "After careful evaluation, we determined that Google’s technology provides the most capable foundation for Apple Foundation Models," the companies stated in a joint release. The financial markets responded with enthusiasm as Alphabet’s stock, which surged approximately 65% throughout 2025, climbed a further 2% on the back of the news. The rally allowed Alphabet to surpass Apple in valuation, briefly making it the second-most valuable company in the

Tech
Softbank, OpenAI pour $1bn into SB Energy
OpenAI and SoftBank Group have finalised a US$1 billion investment in SB Energy to support the "Stargate" initiative - a $500 billion mega program designed to build out critical data centre infrastructure across the United States. This deal involves a $500 million contribution from each party into SB Energy - a California-based power and data centre platform majority-owned by SoftBank - to scale its current development pipeline. OpenAI has leased a new 1.2GW Texas campus in Milam County, where SB Energy will manage the construction and long-term operation of the facility. To bolster its delivery capabilities, SB Energy recently acquired the construction management firm Studio 151 and secured $800 million in additional financing from Ares Management. The Milam County site features on-site power generation to protect local grid stability and is scheduled to begin initial operations in late 2026. Construction at the Texas facility is expected to create several thousand local jobs as the project prioritises resource efficiency and minimised water usage. SoftBank is also developing a separate data centre site in Lordstown, Ohio, which is expected to be operational in 2026 as part of the broader infrastructure rollout.
Tech
Samsung rides AI chip boom to record profit forecast
Samsung Electronics (KOSE: A005930) expects profits to almost triple in the final quarter of last year, setting a new record as soaring memory chip prices and artificial intelligence demand turbocharge its core semiconductor business. South Korea’s biggest company told the market on Thursday that operating profit likely reached KR₩20 trillion (A$20.5 billion) in the three months to December, with consolidated revenue of around 93 trillion won, according to preliminary earnings guidance. If confirmed, the result would eclipse Samsung’s previous quarterly profit record of ₩17.6 trillion set in 2018. The sharp rebound marks a dramatic turnaround from a year earlier, when weak demand and falling chip prices weighed heavily on earnings. This time, the catalyst is AI. Memory chips used in data centres and AI servers are in short supply as companies such as Nvidia race to meet demand for advanced computing systems. As manufacturers prioritise production for these high-margin applications, availability has tightened across the wider memory market, pushing prices sharply higher for chips used in smartphones, personal computers and other consumer devices. Counterpoint Research said the memory market has entered what i
Tech
Mission Critical: CATL pours salt in lithium, cobalt wounds
The battery energy sector, led by China's CATL, is - whether purposefully or not - forcing a fundamental pivot toward sodium-ion (Na-ion) technology to mitigate the supply risks associated with lithium-based chemistries. The move's aim is de-risking manufacturing chains from the price volatility of cobalt, nickel, and lithium carbonate. Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL) confirmed in early 2026 that its salty "Naxtra" cells had moved beyond pilot phases into full industrial integration across multiple vehicle platforms. The rollout serves a dual purpose: providing a buffer against mineral shortages and enabling a lower price floor for entry-level electric transport.Defining sodium technologyA sodium-ion battery operates on a cation-shuttling principle where sodium ions migrate between electrodes through a non-aqueous electrolyte. The metallurgical requirements for sodium differ from lithium systems because the sodium ion possesses a larger physical radius. Standard graphite anodes cannot effectively accommodate these larger ions, necessitating the use of specialised hard carbon which features a non-graphitising, disordered atomic structure. Cathodes typically employ layered transition metal oxide
Tech
xAI finalises US$40 billion funding from tech buddies
Securing a $20 billion Series E funding round earlier today has pushed Elon Musk’s xAI beyond the US$40 billion total capital threshold, joining the likes of Sam Altman's OpenAI. Market valuations for the venture now sit at about $230 billion, establishing the firm as a primary challenger within the foundational model landscape. Internal roadmaps for Grok 5 point toward a first quarter 2026 release, featuring massive parameter scaling and enhanced reasoning tools designed for corporate workflows. Investment interest in this latest tranche was spearheaded by Nvidia and Cisco, alongside institutional heavyweights like Valor Equity Partners and the Qatar Investment Authority. Aggregate funding levels have climbed sharply over the past eighteen months as the organization moves from a research-intensive phase into broad commercialization. Strategic expansion plans detailed on the official xAI blog focus heavily on the Memphis-based Colossus supercomputing cluster. Engineering teams are currently scaling this site to support a hardware footprint exceeding one million graphics processing units, intended to train the next-generation Grok 5 architecture. Recent property acquisitions near the Tennessee facility, includi